by WB McKay
That was Art, silly and sweet, no matter what else was happening. That was never going to change, even if he was in charge. I returned his smile. "And you don't even know the weird stuff I get up to when I'm home alone."
"Ha! Like you do anything different when you're at home. You're a straight shooter, Sophie. That's one of the things I like most about you. Besides, it's not like you're ever alone at home either."
He was right. Phoebe was ever-present. Being spiritually linked to the main tree that held up my treehouse home meant she was able to appear in our apartment anywhere she wanted, and she didn't feel the need for clothes. It was like having a naked ghost for a roommate.
"Yeah, you couldn't imagine the stuff we get up to," I said, thinking of all the annoying little pranks she pulled.
"And now my mind went to a very dirty place," replied Art, giving me a wink.
I punched him in the arm. "Knock that off or I'll tell all the girls at the office you have a thing for a dryad. I bet all of those car loans will stop when they don't think you're single."
Art chuckled. "Oh yes, because all those married ladies are really pining for me and planning to leave their spouses. Besides, I don't need to borrow cars any more. I own this sweet little ride free and clear."
I looked around the tiny interior of the car and realized there was no extra junk anywhere indicating it belonged to someone else and took a deep breath. The car still smelled new. "Look at you, joining the land lubbers!"
"I wouldn't go that far," said Art. "Hammond got me a parking space at MOD. I leave it there when I go home at night."
We popped through the portal. One of the weirdest things about Volarus is the instant time change. The fae city wasn't technically Earth. Volarus was an exciting fae city that served as a waypoint for people who traveled between Earth and Faerie, or who just popped around Earth or Faerie, as I had just done. What had been midnight in Paw Paw, Michigan was now early morning in Volarus, judging by the clock. When we reentered California, it would be about ten at night.
Now that we were safely away from anyone who might see me pull off the mask, I jerked the thing off and leaned my face toward the vents, blasting his fancy new air conditioning. I pulled the hair off my neck and shivered as the sweat turned cold. Next time, I'd definitely pick out a mask that breathed better.
"Speaking of my ride, I'm going to head back to the MOD office. You can take my sweet little car back to Wailing Lakes. I'll borrow a car and be an hour or so behind you."
"Why are we headed back there?"
"Finding Clarissa's not our job," he told me. I glared at him, but refrained from telling him I was aware of what our job was. I could try to get along. I could be nice. I could! "We're still after the scythe," he continued. "It's time to regroup, look at the evidence again, and see if anything stands out now that we know of Clarissa's involvement."
"Uh huh."
"So I'm going to head back to the office. I have some people gathering Clarissa's files for me and contacting agents who've worked with her in the past. You'll go on to Wailing Lakes and check in with the homicide guys—I checked, they're still there. Revisit the scene. I should be there by the time you get done with all that and we can decide where to go from there."
Only say nice things Sophie. Nice things. Say nice things, Sophie.
"And you took the twenty minutes to drive out and get me?"
He smiled. "Of course I did. You're my friend." I swallowed the lump in my throat. Art was so nice, and I was so… "Also, like I said, I have people looking into things for me, so I had a minute, and it was good for us to catch up before we move forward." I kind of wished he'd stopped talking when he'd just said it was because we were friends. But I got it. We were work friends.
"Right. How many people do you have researching things for you today?"
"Just three," he said, and then prattled on about who was helping him and who'd just had a baby and a million other things he knew I didn't care about, so I only half-listened.
Art was always using the office like that. I never bothered. It was too tedious being nice to all those people just to convince them to work with me. Getting out in the field and doing things myself always worked for me.
Which was exactly what he was sending me out to do. It was a good move, even if I was pretty sure he was sending me out to check in with the homicide agents to give me busy work and keep me away from the MOD office while he did things there. If he brought me along with him while everyone was gossiping about my fuck up in Paw Paw, I'd only be a distraction. It was smart not to bring me.
Wasn't he just the clever little worker bee? I smiled over at him. He might not usually take the lead when we worked together, but he was a good leader. And I was still working the case. Things were going to be okay.
I popped a finger in my mouth and then poked it in his ear.
He jerked away and tightened his grip on the steering wheel. "What is happening?" he asked, but he laughed.
"Just showing the boss some respect," I assured him.
"I'm glad to see you're handling this so well."
"You know me."
"That I do," he said. "And I'm guessing you forgot to eat anytime recently."
My stomach grumbled as soon as he said the word eat. "Don't remind me."
"Which is why I went ahead and ordered you a burger at Stars Hamburgers on my drive to pick you up." He parked the car in front of the MOD office and tapped the wheel. "You can pick it up on your way out to Wailing Lakes. It should be ready by the time you get there."
My eyes might have gotten a little misty. "You got me a cheeseburger? But…" Ordering cheeseburgers was for celebrating when the job was done. I'd messed up the job. And kind of been demoted.
"It was an anticipatory order." He punched my arm. "Don't look so glum, Sophie. We'll get this scythe yet. Believe me?"
I punched him back, and he roughed up my hair before ducking out of the car. "Be nice to my car!" He called out as he ran into the office.
I ran around to the driver's side. I had a cheeseburger coming, some research to do, and a scythe to find.
"Time to get back to work," I said.
Like I ever really stopped.
CHAPTER SEVEN
I picked up my cheeseburger and fries on the way out to Wailing Lakes and did my best to enjoy them while my brain worked overtime. Witches with the skill level Clarissa had displayed were rare, and stealing a reaper's scythe was unheard of. What the hell was she up to?
I checked in with the homicide agents who were staying at the Wailing Lakes motel. It almost midnight and they weren't happy to see me. As I expected, they had absolutely no leads, even though they were working with a human agent. They perked up a bit when they told me about their human agent. "She's legit," they assured me. "We checked in with headquarters."
Funny. So funny. "Glad you have time to gossip," I told them. "I'll be off doing my job."
"Try not to blow up any markets."
So. Damn. Funny.
I hit up the crime scene next. Besides the yellow tape everywhere, it now looked like a normal beach beside a quiet lake in the middle of nowhere. No blood, no crater in the ground, and no magical residue to give future visitors the creeps. That was good, I thought. My sisters didn't need any grisly reminders of what had happened here. Unfortunately, it left me back at square one.
By the time I left the crime scene, any good feelings the cheeseburger and the cheer up from Art had given me had officially worn off. I'd made a huge mess of this case, and I hadn't even gotten anywhere yet. I felt useless, but soaking in that wasn't going to help anything, so I headed back to Belinda's house, intent on taking a nap before Art showed up. Maybe I'd get a good ten minutes in. Sleep was a precious commodity when I was working a case. I'd never needed a lot of it to function, but I enjoyed it, and I was marginally less of an asshole when well-rested.
The front door opened quietly, but I didn't need to worry about waking anyone. I could hear Belinda banging a
round in the kitchen and the smell of cinnamon and hot metal assaulted my nose. Unless Owen and Belinda just had a brawl and she was getting over it by making breakfast, there was only one reason for there to be that much dragon magic floating in the air.
To say that Owen was upset would be an understatement. He paced across the living room, grumbling to himself the whole time. "There you are," he said, letting out something between a sigh of relief and a growl. "You've been gone forever."
By my count it had only been a few hours, but time flies when you're almost murdered and your career is thrown in the toilet. Just thinking about what I'd been through got my anger up. Dealing with Owen's worry or whatever it was, that was just too much. "Not now," I ground out. "I have research to do." Who was I kidding with the whole nap thing? I'd sleep when the scythe was found.
"You left me and your sister sitting here all night while you went to a dangerous black market with some new FAB agent, and you didn't even check in to tell us you were all right."
"Check in?" If I'd been a dragon, smoke would have shot out my nose. "Why would I be required to check in, exactly, Owen?"
"Oh, don't do that. I called you. I texted. What does it take to let us know you're okay?"
"Okay. Yeah. Right. I was okay." I started laughing. I couldn't stop it. Shit. "I was just super."
"What's wrong?" He reached out a hand and grabbed my arm, but I backed away, still laughing.
"Nothing," I said. "I'm a-okay."
"Sophie?" Belinda asked from the hallway. Her eyes were concerned, and when I glanced over, Owen was giving me the same look. My laughter fizzled out.
"It was a bad night," I said.
Owen sunk down on the sofa and patted the cushion, waiting for me to do the same.
I don't know why, but I did it. And then I told them about all of it, including stuff from the case that I probably shouldn't have been sharing with them. I told them about Clarissa not being on the case, about her attacking me at the market, about Hammond chewing me out—rightfully so—and everybody everywhere knowing about it. I told them about everyone already gossiping about me because of the trip to Faerie, and how while that talk was mostly good because I'd gotten a difficult job done, it was also a lot of whispering about how weird I was. And how I already knew that this fuck up—where a human had gotten the best of me—would thrill them, because it would serve as proof that I was really the loser they already thought I was. And then, because that all felt a little naked, I jumped back to telling them the facts of the case—that Clarissa was out there with the scythe, that Art was running the show now, and that I was really nowhere near finding the scythe and didn't even know why she wanted it.
"Fuck those fuckers at your office," Belinda said. She always had a way with words.
"Here, here!" Owen agreed.
I managed a little smile.
"It doesn't matter," I said.
"Listen, Sophie," Owen took my hand, "why did you go to the market in the first place?"
I sighed. I hated this crap where people asked questions to lead you to some answer. "I don't know."
He wasn't deterred. "You went to the market to uncover information that would lead you to the killer's identity. Right?"
"Right."
"You uncovered the killer's identity! Yes, it got messy, but you still more than reached your goal. You did it!"
They were both all smiles and my shoulders couldn't help but relax a little. He was right. I did figure out who the killer was, and my work was never clean and easy. "That's true," I finally said, and then with a sigh added, "I just need to find this scythe and get this thing solved."
"Of course," said Owen. "That's the spirit. So, what do we do now? Breakfast? I can show you my research while we eat."
"Sure," I said. More food sounded good.
"I'm sorry you had such a bad night." Owen's thumb rubbed circles over the back of my hand. He looked so sweet and kind, I could almost ignore that he was pitying me. Almost.
"It's the job," I said. "I'll do better next time."
"You know," he grinned, "this wouldn't have happened if you'd brought me along. Next time you could do that."
"Right," I retorted, pulling my hand away from his so fast that I pulled him off balance. "Because I need a big, strong man around at all times to protect me." I got right up in his face. "In case you've forgotten, I did this job just fine for years without your dragon ass there to get in the way."
The softness blinked out of his eyes, and I felt relieved. Fighting, I understood. All of this tenderness and protectiveness was foreign territory. "Well, if I would have been there, I wouldn't have left your back unguarded. That witch wouldn't have had an opportunity to throw fire at you."
"Yeah, and then I would have thought that Clarissa was still on my side." I stabbed a finger into his chest. "And I would be even further behind on this investigation than I already am." Yep, I could spin almost dying into a positive outcome if it meant that I was right and he was wrong. "Listen here. I am burden enough to plenty of people in this world, and you are not one of them. If you want some kind of project, you can go find some other crow, because I'm not it. Understand?" I ignored the look in his eyes. "It's about time you went back to your lair, dragon boy." I huffed and spun on a heel, headed to Belinda's office. I paused when I saw the look on her face. She had opinions about our argument, and I could tell they weren't all going to be ones I wanted to hear. "And you," I said, "can keep that look to yourself." I stomped into the office and slammed the door.
There were low murmurs from the other room, but I ignored them. Belinda wouldn't let him follow me. She'd probably pop in later, but only after I'd had a chance to calm down.
I slumped into the comfy swivel chair and booted up Belinda's ancient computer. She was of the opinion that as long as it worked, there was no reason to replace it. It killed me to admit she was probably right. It worked fine to browse the web, and that's all she needed it for. That was all I needed it for too.
I opened a browser and started by doing a search for Clarissa Stark. In under a minute I had all of her social media profiles open and I let out a satisfied sigh. It wasn't a habit I indulged frequently, but I was a pro at internet stalking. It calmed me. There was something about finding that juicy little tidbit that someone shared because they assumed only people they intended to would ever read it.
The key to finding those tidbits was locating the profiles that people created where they didn't use their real names. People liked to think these accounts couldn't be linked to those with their real names, but they always messed up somewhere. Often it was in a username mentioned in both places, common friends, or similar postings on multiple accounts. Such activity would look like a weak link, but once that connection was made, there were bound to be other things linking them together. It took a lot of digging.
The first thing anyone would notice about Clarissa from her social media accounts was that she was mostly a loner, and rather pretentious. Every now and then I had to stop and look up some of the ridiculous words she used. She enjoyed posting articles, accompanied by long personal rants, to almost no reaction by her few friends.
Six months ago, she had one friend who liked most of Clarissa's posts. The two of them weren't friends anymore, but the girl's account was mostly public, so I went back six months in her posts. She posted more frequently and about a wider variety of topics than Clarissa. She had a thing for memes with puns. When I isolated her postings related to witchcraft, only a few of her friends reacted, and just one of them to every single post. Their userpic was a generic drawing of a tree with long roots. I opened up KnowledgeIsPower's account. Got you. Even fewer friends than Clarissa Stark's account, but a lot of recycled posts. And now I had a username.
Google produced a lot of hits. Most of them were on forums for witches, and she was all over them, talking to everyone. At least she had been, in her earlier days. Slowly, her conversations began to delve into ways to work more magic, and her tone with other
s became dismissive. If they weren't interested in talking about how to manipulate stronger magic, she didn't have time for them.
Eventually, her online friends dwindled to just a few who shared her interest in gaining new skills. I read thread after thread of her and a user named DarkRaven talking about sacrificial rites and blood magic. The conversation grew more and more graphic until a moderator stepped in and they both stopped posting, but not before mentioning a new forum they could talk in. Clarissa encouraged any lurkers out there in pursuit of knowledge to follow them to the new forum. The way she talked in the thread, it was clear that she didn't see herself as power-hungry. She always spoke in terms of becoming more knowledgeable, as if it was the most holy of pursuits. They had an obligation to share information with others on this path.
Right.
The new forum was easy enough to find, but most of the posts were members only. Time to join the creepy party. Writing up a fake profile didn't take much. I was a witch thirsty for knowledge, with a few hints that I may be drained of morals. Being too obvious with that kind of thing would get suspicious, but I wanted to make it easy for the mod.
While I wouldn't have access to most of the posts until my profile was approved, registering did give me access to the list of members, and none of Clarissa's usual usernames were there. It was possible that she'd left the forum already, but I didn't think so. It was time to head back to social media.
A few quick searches through her Twitter timeline revealed DarkRaven tweeting at Clarissa. It didn't take much reading through their tweets to find DarkRaven referring to Clarissa by the name DeathMaiden. That wasn't creepy at all.
I went back to the forum member list and found DeathMaiden there, as expected. I wanted to let out a whoop, but there wasn't anyone around to appreciate my massive internet sleuthing talents. It sounded a lot better to call it sleuthing than stalking, so I made a mental note to refer to it that way from now on. Now I just had to kill some time until I gained full access to the forum and could find the good dirt.